"It's just you and me now, sport." Forget The Silence of the Lambs. Manhunter is the original. If you want to understand the word "genius," look no further than the "Moment of the Truth" scene when Will Graham began to figure out the identity of the killer. It's brilliant stuff. In reality, a serial killer can remain elusive for years. Logging hundreds of thousand hours, it only takes one trivial piece of evidence or sheer luck like a routine motor vehicle violation for the detectives to catch him finally.

It goes without saying you'll never see anything like Blade Runner which is a Philip K. Dick adaptation just like Total Recall. What an amazing job by everybody for making it in 1981. It's a stunning accomplishment, indeed. The story is simple: Harrison Ford is a Blade Runner and his job is to kill robots, called Replicants, who have illegally come to Earth. That's the whole movie.

There are few films that are as exciting and inspiring as Point Break. I bet if anyone watched the movie just once, he may have entertained some thoughts about changing his entire lifestyle. Bodhi perfectly describes the truth-seeking experience: "Pure adrenaline, right?!? The ultimate rush. Other guys snort for it, jab a vein for it...all you gotta do is jump." Sounds pretty simple, eh? Patrick Swayze did the skydiving stunts and is thus captivating. It's easy to realize it in Johnny Utah's eyes when he saw what Bodhi could do.

William Friedkin sure knows how to make exciting movies. There are many compelling elements in To Live and Die in L.A., and the biggest of them all is William Petersen's supercharged performance. Of course, Michael Mann saw so much talent that he had to have him again for Manhunter. Then, there's the young Willem Dafoe in a brilliant, chilling role as Eric Masters.

Tommy Lee Jones is the master of organization, telling people to get on it and do their jobs and refusing to take no for an answer. That's why he won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor although he was in a leading role. Harrison Ford is brilliant as Dr. Richard Kimble while Andreas Katsulas will always be that one-armed guy.

The Untouchables is an exquisitely shot picture. Two key scenes are the main reasons for its high replayability value. Also, a lot of it has to do with Kevin Costner, Billy Drago, and Robert De Niro for giving excellent performances. A much-deserved Oscar nomination went to the Costume Design team that's led by Marilyn Vance.

Executive Decision may be 133 minutes long, but the editing is so good that time isn't a factor. It's about the suspense and what the best course of action should be. In other words, it's a thinking man's picture. Hence, Stuart Baird deserves praise for his vision.

Benicio del Toro is the reason to watch this film over and over. It's such a classy performance that ends with his character watching a kids baseball game and knowing what he had done. It's not easy to turn a film with many competing storylines into an outstanding picture, but Steven Soderbergh, who's always been a top-notch director in his own right, accomplished this feat which led to an Oscar win for him.

Shot on location in Hungary, Citizen X is the story of how an infamous serial killer was captured in the USSR which took many years due to bureaucrats and limitations in technology and manpower. What's not revealed is after investigating over 150,000 citizens, the authorities incidently solved more than 1,000 unrelated crimes including 95 murder and 245 rape cases. Now, that's what you call "looking at the bright side of a negative situation."

Frank Horrigan has one job to do, and that's to stop John Malkovich from stealing the scenes. It's a good story which includes a tie-in with the JFK's assassination. To add authenticity to In the Line of Fire, it's the first time ever the Secret Service offered its full cooperation during the making of the picture.

Here's a worthy film in Jack Nicholson's résumé: The Border. The noirish atmosphere of El Paso is perfectly set up, and the characters are well-developed. It's sort of Kafka-esque. Mexicans are all over the place, running back and forth across the border. The patrols round them up and ship them back to Mexico only to see them again the next day, hence the repeated scenes.

Tom Berenger may be the show as Gary Simmons, a totally normal-looking handsome family man with a messed-up mind, but all the credit goes to Debra Winger for making the film suspenseful. While watching it, I thought, "How is she going to get out of the situation?" At any rate, it's probably the most realistic portrayal of what special agents deal with while undercover.

Midnight Run is a high-quality picture with a good story to boot. A lot of people might say Charles Grodin was the show, but Robert De Niro is the one who made the picture as it is. The latter is funny, and when he has a witty line or a good moment, he makes the most of it and leaves a lasting impression.

Shot on location in New Mexico, Roger Donaldson crafts a taut neo-noir entitled White Sands which has plenty of tension. He also keeps the story appealling enough to follow while generating uniformly excellent performances from the all-star cast. Willem Dafoe shines along with Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, and they steal some of the scenes when together.

As a teacher to Johnny Depp, Al Pacino has moments of brilliance. It's the way he talks and how the lines roll off his tongue. The screenplay is authentic as most of it was taken from actual wiretaps, hence the film's sole Oscar nomination. Joseph D. Pistone deemed everything to be "85% accurate" and wasn't able to see his family for over two years.